Michael Nobel

Michael Nobel was a member of the Nobel family, a great-grandson of the industrialist Ludvig Nobel and a great-grandnephew of Alfred NobelAlfred NobelAlfred Nobel (1833–1896) was a Swedish chemist, engineer, inventor and industrialist who invented dynamite, the blasting cap, blasting gelatine and the smokeless powder ballistite and founded enterprises in more than 20 countries. Through his will he left his fortune to establish the five Nobel Prizes in physics, chemistry, physiology or medicine, literature and peace.Open the full entry.⁠[1][2][3]

Sources differ on his birth: the obituary published by the TUM Institute for Advanced Study (TUM-IAS) gives February 3, 1940, while the award introduction published by FICAC says he was born in Stockholm in 1941.⁠[2][1]

He studied in Sweden and the United States and later obtained a doctorate in psychopedagogy at the University of Lausanne; the TUM-IAS obituary describes his studies there as psychology.⁠[1][2]

He then spent seven years as a social science researcher at the University of Lausanne’s Institute for Mass Communication and at the Department of Social Psychiatry of the Institute of Social and Preventive Medicine, and served as a consultant to UNESCO in Paris and to the United Nations Social Affairs Division in Geneva on methods of drug abuse prevention.⁠[1][2][4]

In 1981, as European Vice President of Fonar Corporation, he took part in introducing magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) in Europe. The TUM-IAS obituary says that as an entrepreneur he brought a novel method of nuclear magnetic resonance imaging to market maturity.⁠[1][4][2]

From 1991 to 2006 he served first as vice chairman and then as chairman of the board of the Nobel family association (the Nobel Family Society; the NST website calls it the Nobel Family Association), spending about 15 years on the family board.⁠[4][3][1]

From 1991 to 2007 he was executive chairman of MRIAB Group, which provided MRI diagnostic services to hospitals across Sweden (the FICAC introduction spells it MRAB Group). By 2015 he was chairman or board member of six international companies in medical diagnostics, treatment and information systems.⁠[4][1]

From 2007 to 2012 he was a visiting professor at the Frontier Research Institute of the Tokyo Institute of Technology; he later became a senior fellow at the university’s Centre for the Study of World Civilizations and a professor at Seisa University. Osaka City University’s Advanced Research Institute of Natural Science and Technology also named him a Distinguished Professor.⁠[1][4]

On August 17, 2007, a foundation named The Nobel Charitable Trust was entered in the commercial register in Zurich, Switzerland, with the purpose of awarding prizes to individuals, institutions, companies and governments distinguished in promoting sustainable energy, in particular by reducing pollutants to curb global warming or by inventing alternative energy sources; it was later renamed The Nobel Sustainability Trust. He co-founded the foundation with other members of the Nobel family and served as president of its foundation board.⁠[5][2][4][5]

On August 30, 2007, the organizers of the nanotechnology conference nanoTX’07 and the Nobel Charitable Trust announced in a joint news release that he would unveil the “Dr. Michael Nobel Award” at the conference in Dallas in October, describing it as the first new award associated with the Nobel family name since the economics prize was established in 1968, to be given in four categories: scientists, corporate leaders, political leaders and celebrities. He said in the release that the award was being created, “lending the credibility of the Nobel family name” to it, to seek solutions to the most important challenge of the 21st century.⁠[6]

The Nobel Family Society and the Nobel Foundation objected to the announcement of the “Dr. Michael Nobel Prize,” calling it a “clear misuse of the reputation” of the Nobel Prize. On September 17, 2007, the organizers of nanoTX’07 severed all ties with him; he did not appear at the conference and no new prize was announced there.⁠[7]

On October 4, 2007, Philip Nobel, on behalf of four family members including him, responded that he had never introduced himself as chairman of the Nobel Family Society but as chairman of the Nobel Charitable Trust Foundation, proposing to announce the awards in its name, and had repeatedly asked the organizers to correct their press release; the $25,000 linked to the award was intended for the foundation, not for personal use. The response also said the foundation had been created by three members of the Nobel Family Society’s board, one of them the current head of the Nobel family, rejecting the Nobel Foundation’s claim that he lacked the family’s support. It was signed by Philip Nobel, Gustaf Nobel, Michael Nobel and Peter NobelPeter NobelPeter Nobel (1931–2026) was a Swedish lawyer and human rights jurist and a great-grandson of Ludvig Nobel; in 1986 he became Sweden’s first Ombudsman against Ethnic Discrimination, later served as secretary-general of the Swedish Red Cross and as a member of the UN Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination, and was a long-standing public critic of the economics prize awarded in the Nobel name.Open the full entry.⁠[8]

In 2012 the Nobel Sustainability Trust co-hosted CleanEquity Monaco and engaged Innovator Capital to develop the Nobel Sustainability Fund, a multi-phase, multi-technology, multi-geography sustainable technology fund.⁠[9]

On December 6, 2012, at the invitation of ComTrade Advisory Board member Mark Minevich, he visited the company’s technology centre in Belgrade, Serbia, as a friend, learning about the solutions developed in its software labs. He said he had come to meet new people and explore potential future collaboration with the company.⁠[10]

In June 2015 FICAC published the introduction given by Nikolaos Margaropoulos when presenting him with the FICAC Order of Merit, the commemorative medal marking the 50th anniversary of the Vienna Convention on Consular Relations. The introduction notes that he sat on several international prize committees and had received an honorary doctorate from Soka University in Japan and honorary professorships from the National Academy of Science of Azerbaijan and the Alfred Nobel University in Ukraine. The NST website says he received twelve honorary doctorates and professorships in all.⁠[1][4]

On October 29, 2015, he lectured at the Nagoya Institute of Technology on “The innovative genius of the Nobel BrothersBranobelBranobel (Товарищество нефтяного производства братьев Нобель, Petroleum Production Company Nobel Brothers) was an oil company founded in St. Petersburg in 1879 by Ludvig, Robert and Alfred Nobel and others; centred on Baku, it pioneered oil pipelines and tankers in Russia and by the early 20th century ranked among the world’s largest oil companies, before its Russian assets were nationalised by the Bolsheviks in 1920, the year half of its shares were sold to Standard Oil of New Jersey.Open the full entry and the Nobel Prizes,” covering the Nobel family’s history and the background to the founding of the Nobel Prize before an audience of more than 200 people.⁠[11]

On September 19, 2016, he visited the Igor Sikorsky Kyiv Polytechnic Institute (KPI) in Ukraine together with the Austrian surgeon Mykola Korban. The university described him as head of a sustainable development fund in Zurich and of several non-profit organizations in education, development and international conflict settlement. After the talks, a National Nomination Committee of Ukraine for the fund’s sustainable development prize was created at KPI, headed by Borys Paton, president of the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine.⁠[12][13]

In March 2018 he attended CleanEquity Monaco as chairman of the Nobel Sustainability Trust. He said the official recognition of the award and the foundation expressed at the conference by Prince Albert of Monaco was “of outmost importance” to both the organization and himself, and that sustainability policies needed to become an integral part of human activity.⁠[9]

In December 2019, as president of the Nobel Sustainability Trust, he made his second visit to KPI. Talks on December 4 covered the work of the nomination committee and the projects submitted for the prize, and he invited Ukraine, and KPI in particular, to provide expert support for the foundation’s future evaluations.⁠[13]

He wrote the foreword to Betraying the Nobel, a book by Unni Turrettini criticizing the selection of the Nobel Peace Prize. In it he argued that the Nobel Peace Institute had betrayed the “original conditions of Alfred Nobel’s will and intentions” and called its selection process “very sketchy.”⁠[3]

On November 21, 2022, the Nobel Sustainability Trust held its second annual summit at the Palais Brongniart in Paris, focusing on energy and water. As the trust’s chairman, he said the annual Sustainability Award would focus on applied science and recognize sustainable development projects worldwide in fields including energy, materials, water, health, agriculture, IT and AI.⁠[14]

On December 14, 2022, the Nobel Sustainability Trust and the Technical University of Munich (TUM) announced a partnership to present Sustainability Awards in three categories, for research and development in water and in energy and for leadership in implementing sustainability projects, with annual prize money totalling 1.3 million Swedish krona provided by the trust and the selection organized by TUM-IAS. As the trust’s chairman, he said the economic and social well-being of civilization would depend largely on the availability of energy and on a sustainable approach to agriculture and forestry, industrial production and water treatment.⁠[15][2]

In 2023 he attended the third NST Summit in Munich. A Swiss Official Gazette of Commerce notice of July 25, 2023 shows that Peter Nobel succeeded him as president of the foundation board, while he became a board member, retaining sole signing authority.⁠[2][5]

He died on November 27, 2024; the TUM-IAS obituary gives his age as 83. In the obituary TUM and TUM-IAS described him as an entrepreneur, philanthropist and friend of the TUM-IAS, noting that in later years he devoted himself to sustainability, especially in renewable energy and clean technology, as an advisor and board member of international companies and NGOs.⁠[2]

Nobel Sustainability Trust: Official website: https://www.nobelsustainabilitytrust.org/ (opens in a new window)⁠[4]